I’m in danger here of overstating my love affair with Apple. I don’t have an iPhone, and I don’t drive a Mac Book. I was a corporate Apple user in the late eighties, but can remember a period in the mid nineties when every new Apple product was a dog; and an expensive one, at that. I came to iPad via an iPod touch; a great experience, made bigger and better.

So, two months in, how do things stand? What I’ve found is that when I want to view my calendar, check mail (even in the office), mess about with social media or browse a web site, I go to the iPad. If I’m working out of the office, then I’ll also view and edit docs and create mind maps straight off the iPad. I’m getting more confident of running presentations from it too , though you need to rehearse any content you import from PowerPoint. There are very few times, when I’m working at a laptop, that I don’t have the iPad along side, keeping web content visible, or displaying supporting docs.

In short, it’s become the device I turn to first, whether for work or leisure. It’s become a device of ‘first resort’. Also, more and more of my content is being stored in the cloud, by Dropbox and what have you, because it’s way, way more convenient to work that way when you’re hopping between devices. So the cloud is becoming, at the very least, a storage option of first resort.

It’s interesting to reflect where that leaves Microsoft. It’s comforting to know that if I have any digital ‘heavy lifting’ to do, then Windows and Office is there for me. Likewise, the office server holds a vast amount of info, reasonably cheaply. But if my experience can in anyway be generalised, and if tablets, smart phones and cloud storage are becoming the first resort of us prosumers, then that makes Microsoft’s offering more of a ‘last resort’ for many. Back stop is never a totally bad space to occupy, but I bet it doesn’t gel with the ambitions of Mr Balmer and co.

BP are by no means out of the woods yet, but having flatlined deep within the pit of US consumer hatred for a good few weeks, it has become clear that the only way is up and – notwithstanding the eye-catching japery of Greenpeace protesters  - sooner or later that’s the way they will head with Bob ‘Personality’ Dudley in charge.

When embattled by bad news and scathing criticism, you need a focus for it; a lightning rod to draw out the very worst.  Step forward, Tony Hayward.  Having demonstrated his utter inability to ingratiate himself to the general public (he’s an oil executive, what do you expect? – Ed.), he simultaneously managed to reflect the sheer futility of attempting doing so in the first place.  JFK would have ended up looking like Pol Pot in the circumstances.  In other words, he had the impossible job, and so – from a communications perspective – perhaps the best policy was to be bloody terrible at doing it… for quite some period of time.

The result is a BP with the potential to be reborn.  The leak is being managed, the clean-up is working, the money has been put aside…oh…and Tony has gone as well.  Argue all you want about what an insensitive, incapable buffoon he is or was, but when the incoming boss thanks Tony for all his hard work, he for one will really mean it.

However, I did pick up an interesting little story this week about PR Week’s Deputy Feature Editor spending a while ‘on the dark side’ by occupying the role of a PR executive at a global agency office based in London, and reporting in her daily blog about the experience.  In return, the agency (Bite Communications) gets to plug one of its staffers into the PR Week editorial team.

This really is PR turned up so loud it might make your nose bleed.  To summarise:

-          PR Week readers (i.e. PR people)…

• …get to find out what a journalist thinks about doing the job that they do every day
• … plus they also get to read PR Week editorial (about PR) written by a PR person, rather than a journalist   

-          PR Week publishers…

• …get the opportunity to reiterate how ‘in tune’ they are with their readers, firstly by ensuring that one of their journalists soberly reflects on how surprisingly demanding and unforgiving the PR profession is, and secondly while also allowing a PR industry insider to apparently ‘run riot’ on the editorial desk for an issue

-          The PR agency

• …not only achieve positive and exclusive press exposure simply by merit of being the agency in question (credit where it is due; it was probably their idea), but they also – presumably – take the opportunity to profoundly sanitise the working environment for the incoming PR-pro-for-a-week-journo, and in so doing:
  • Promote the idea of the agency being a good choice of partner for prospective purchasers of PR services
  • Promote concepts of friendliness, inclusivity and success within the agency for the benefit of prospective new talent from elsewhere in the industry
  • Educate the journalist about the different projects, initiatives and upcoming agency news that they’ve got going on
  • Develop an even better relationship with the journalist, for exploitation at a later date.

It’s beautiful, in that twisted sort of way; like the way watching a tiny songbird quietly freezing to death can be beautiful (alright then, not really).  Either I’m a helpless cynic, or the parties involved in this tryst have been missing opportunities on both sides.

Today, the other 99% of the UK PR industry is clapping its hands with joy at the idiocy of some joke PR agency that thought it would be a good idea to ‘incentivise’ journalists to write about their clients.  The deal goes something like this: “Give our client some press coverage Mr Journalist, and you might win an iPad!”

Consider for a moment, why this might prove to be a teensy-weensy bit counterproductive.  Said PR agency is not fighting to get the very last seat on the lifeboat of a sinking ship with this stunt, it is presumably trying (or at least it should be) to shape public opinion toward its client’s wares by shaping the opinion and the news/editorial priorities of trade IT journalists.

Here’s the PR/journalist ‘cash for column inches’ transaction played out in another format:

PR:                         “Hi, here’s an iPad.”

Journo:                 “Wow, thanks.”

PR:                         “Write a story then, there’s a good chap.”

Journo:                 “Er, no.”

On some occasions, with some journalists, you might get a different outcome.  Just remember that press coverage you have to pay for, probably isn’t worth buying in the first place.  It certainly isn’t worth reading.

So it came as a bit of a surprise to bump into some bloke the other day, who has built a £30 million business by  supplying slightly used Newbridge TDM gear to all of those circuit switched networks out there that ought not to still exist. Did he need any marketing support? Nope – too bloody busy selling the stuff.  Good margins too.

To cap a shocking seven days, Analysys Mason has now come out (do you suppose they told their parents first?)  and stated that Cloud computing will probably follow a ‘hybrid’ model.

Hybrid is a tech swear word, used on those occasions when the punter turns out to be not as gullible as our industry had first assumed. It means, bugger it, that the paradigm isn’t going to shift over night.  Maybe not even by a week next Tuesday.  The punter wants to place an each way bet: a tenner on the favourite and two fivers on the twelve-to-one hopeful.

In the case of Cloud computing, it means that the punter is not planning to place all of their most critical computing resources in a facility that they can’t see or touch; with a provider that they don’t really know; in a jurisdiction that they don’t fully understand. The pussies.

Instead, they want to keep a good dollop of computing power under their desks – or at least under their control. They’ll place another dollop, perhaps for disaster recovery and continuity purposes, in the Cloud. Or maybe shift the dollops around a bit, as their demand for computing power varies.

There you go: hybrid Cloud. The real surprise is that it’s taken this long for the industry to work this out. We had hybrid packet and circuit switched networks in the 90’s. We had hybrid TDM and IP voice networks in the Noughties. Ferrari has just launched a hybrid petrol-electric sports car…

Wasn’t this kind of evitable?

That’s a big shame, not least of all because ‘ex-PR’ journalists tend to be very good at their jobs, very principled, yet always get the most value out of the PR process.  I can think of two off the top of my head; one is an extremely successful news editor; the other a prolific freelance feature writer.  Their experience of working with journalists informed them it would be hard crossing over, so they went into it with their eyes wide open, and are now both very satisfied with their lot.

Aside from their writing expertise and insight into the workings of publications, one of the anticipated benefits of ex-journalists taking roles at PR agencies is their contacts.  You can’t teach someone to hold good contacts; you either have them or you don’t.  However, if that’s pretty much all an ex-hack is selling themselves on, then they will quickly become disillusioned with their new PR job.  All too often, PR looks like an easy earner – but walk a mile in a PR’s shoes and you’ll soon find your feet aching.  To blindly assume that great journalists will make great PRs is pretty sketchy judgment.  Some will be; many won’t.

The current Byers-Hoon-Hewitt lobbying story is showing no signs of slowing down, and the thing that strikes you is the sheer arrogance of assuming that ‘contacts are everything’.  Even if it was all pukka and above board, I’d be surprised if many MPs could make a good fist of lobbying as a profession, despite their experienced perspective from the other side of the table.  While ministers, their mistake would have been to overlook the skills of ’the lobby’ and see them only as carbuncles (albeit soaked in cash) fighting for the influence of the powerful. 

Good luck trying to get a job now!

Cloud is one area where the IT channel – so often maligned as a boisterous bunch of box-hawking reprobates – has stolen a bit of a march on the more high-falutin’ techie commentators.  They were talking about this absolutely ages ago, back when Google was just a search engine.

It boils down to the fact that channel people are sales people, and take a simple and honest view on ‘new technological paradigms’.  They’ve seen more so-called revolutions than a reincarnated Maoist, and are a fairly safe barometer of bullshit.  They know that there are three things they can sell: kit, consultancy, and cloud.  Kit gets delivered in a van, consultancy gets delivered on a bit of paper, and cloud gets delivered over a connection.

Revolution, shmevolution...

Let’s not forget that resellers and their ilk work at the coalface of the IT industry; they understand customers, they understand vendors, they understand how to make money out of it all.  Want cloud innovation?  Look no further…

Encourage the cloud debate to precipitate (geddit?) by all means, but let the channel have the final word.

Vince, earlier

With the coming UK general election widely tipped to result in a hung parliament, Cable is using his public platform to position himself for a top coalition job; perhaps even Chancellor…

If that doesn’t work out then I reckon he could land a decent whack in the media.  He could even front his own show; I can see the opening credits now: ‘Cable TV’…

PR is the ultimate weapon in promoting reputation, but as Vinny shows, this is not always exclusively for the organisation who foots the bill.  Certainly the Lib Dems are getting good mileage out of their Cable (boom boom), which is just as well because the PROs who manage his press commitments and keep him front of mind among top business and politico journos will be costing a few bob.  But you can’t help wondering whether it’s Vinny who’s getting most of the benefit and none of the cost…

People buy from people, and so the media feed their readerships by reflecting that fact.  Personalities always win out, along with all their attendant frailties and virtues.

Speaking of job interviews, we’ll be starting ours soon for new PR execs once we’ve closed the application process.  People buy from people remember, and that’s true in every step of the PR process.  If in doubt – ask Vinny.

Al Gore eat your heart out

I generally dislike the navel gazing that festers within PR circles, but watching the response to this campaign has been very interesting.  As you might expect, some journalists are at the end of their tethers after years of being spammed with press releases that don’t suit their preferences.  Others seem to accept that it comes with the territory.  The campaign itself is a good piece of PR for the wire agency.  Their service is paid for by PRs, but serves the press community, so the message here is spot on, and the response from all quarters is unequivocal and vociferous support; journalists can air grievances and war stories, while PRs can witch-hunt the ‘other agencies’ that get up to that sort of nonsense.

Have I ever sent press releases to journalists that don’t want them?  Well I dare say I probably have, but then I’ve also helped hundreds of journalists file thousands of stories over the years.  Is mindless PR spam a counterproductive waste that should be mitigated?  You’re damn right it is…

Now this is the bit where I’m supposed to bleat on about the utterly obvious importance of listening to and understanding journalists, and having media relationships to underpin the press release distribution and pitching process…  But PR doesn’t need PR.  Pick up any newspaper or magazine and you’ll find that fact staring back up at you.

A marketing company marketing itself… whatever next?

Having the utmost credibility in practising what you preach is most difficult for technology businesses, because it more frequently involves the cultural adoption of new working practices rather than simply using your own kit.  Anyone can test Renault’s corporate belief that their cars are the best, simply by having a look around Renault’s own car park.  But working for an IT security vendor – for example – necessitates a much higher threshold in terms of user policy and behaviour than just having the company product installed on the network.

Credibilty always needs to be examined close-up, whether you are a technology business or not.

Dev